AION 2 Pet Selection Chest Guide — Which Pet Should You Choose?

TL;DR

The Advance: Pet Selection Chest gives you one of four pets — Papis, Silver Blade Rotan, Konutin Worker, or Black Smoke Murute.
All four pets have equal base stats. No one pet is faster or stronger than the others at this stage.
Pick based on which design you like. You are not giving up anything by choosing for looks.
Your choice contributes to Genus Insight — the long-term progression layer tied to pet collection.
You also receive Pagati automatically from the Advance: Pet Chest before opening the selection chest.
Pets auto-collect loot, serve as mounts, and feed Owned Effects that stay active even when the pet is not equipped.
You can get the other three pets later through normal gameplay — this is not a permanent lock.

Table of Contents

What Is the AION 2 Pet Selection Chest?

Early in AION 2, you receive an Advance: Pet Chest in your mailbox. Opening it gives you two things: the special pet Pagati automatically, and one Advance: Pet Selection Chest. The selection chest is where the actual decision happens.

When you open the selection chest from your inventory, you see four distinct pets. You pick one. The other three are gone. This is a one-time choice, so it is worth knowing what you are actually deciding before you tap a name without thinking.

The good news is that the decision is much simpler than it looks.

How to Claim and Open the Pet Selection Chest

Open the Mail menu and go to the System tab.
Find the mail titled “AION2 Launch Reward” and collect the attached Advance: Pet Chest.
Open your Cube (inventory) and use the Advance: Pet Chest. This gives you Pagati automatically and adds the Advance: Pet Selection Chest to your inventory.
Use the Advance: Pet Selection Chest from your inventory to open the four-pet list.
Pick your pet. Your selection is applied immediately.
To equip your new pet, open the in-game menu and go to the Pets section, also reachable through the Closet.

The chest is Bound — you cannot trade it to another player or hold it on a different character. Open it on the character you plan to play.

How to Claim and Open the Pet Selection Chest 2

What Pets Are Inside the Advance: Pet Selection Chest?

The four pets inside the Advance: Pet Selection Chest are:

Papis — a Fera genus pet. Can be farmed from monsters later in the game.
Silver Blade Rotan — a Varian genus pet. Can also be obtained through monster farming.
Konutin Worker — a Cogni genus pet.
Black Smoke Murute — a Natura genus pet. Cannot be directly farmed from monsters; obtained through chests and other sources.

Each of these pets serves as both a companion and a mount. They all belong to different genera — the five genus types in AION 2 are Cogni, Fera, Natura, Varian, and Special.

Which Pet Should You Choose?

The short answer: pick the one you like the most by appearance.

All four pets in the selection chest have identical base stats at this stage. Movement speed is the same across all of them. There is no hidden faster option. Choosing Papis over Konutin Worker does not make you slower or weaker at launch. This is confirmed by the game — no pet in the chest gives you a meaningful stat advantage over another.

The longer answer is that each pet belongs to a different Genus, and developing pets in a specific Genus feeds the Genus Insight progression system. If you know which Genus you plan to invest in heavily later on, picking a chest pet from that same Genus gives you a small head start. But for a new player, this consideration is not urgent at all. You can collect the others later.

What About the Episode 1 Quest Pet?

After completing the All Geared Up quest in Episode 1 (around Level 11), you speak to Kaidros and receive your choice of a free pet from a separate set of three options. The Fossa, a Fera genus pet, is popular here because it immediately works as a ground mount. Your pre-registration selection chest and this Episode 1 pick are independent of each other — you get both.

This means you start the game with at least two free pets right away. Neither choice cancels out the other.

How Pets Work in AION 2

Before you decide, it helps to understand what pets actually do. Pets in AION 2 are not just cosmetic. They work on three levels.

Loot Collection

Your active pet automatically picks up loot from the ground as you kill monsters. This saves a lot of time during grinding sessions. You do not need to manually run over every item drop.

Mount

Most pets can be ridden as ground mounts once their Pet Insight reaches level 1. Some unlock gliding at level 2 and a Transform ability at level 3. The mount function is what players notice most early in the game.

Owned Effects

This is the part most new players miss. Every pet you unlock adds Owned Effects to your character permanently — even when you are not actively riding that pet. The Pets menu collects all these passive bonuses in an All Owned Effects panel. As long as you have unlocked a pet, its Owned Effect is applying to your stats whether or not it is your active companion.

This means collecting more pets makes your character stronger passively. You are not just building a cosmetic collection. Each unlock has real stat value behind it.

How Pet Insight Works

Every pet has a Pet Insight level that you raise by collecting more Souls of that pet. Souls drop from specific monsters in the open world, from Pet Soul Chests, from the Black Cloud Merchant, and from various events.

5 Souls: Unlocks the pet initially (if it is a soul-based pet rather than a chest pet)
25 Souls: Raises Pet Insight to level 2, unlocks more Owned Effects, grants Genus Insight EXP
75 Souls: Raises Pet Insight to level 3 (maximum in the global version), unlocks the final Owned Effect, grants more Genus Insight EXP

So fully developing one pet to maximum Pet Insight takes 105 Souls total. Pets you get from chests like the selection chest start already unlocked — you just need to gather Souls to push them to higher Pet Insight levels.

What Is Genus Insight and Does It Affect Your Pet Choice?

Genus Insight is the deeper progression system sitting beneath individual pet levels. Every pet belongs to one of five genera — Cogni, Fera, Natura, Varian, and Special — and raising Pet Insight for any pet in a genus generates Genus Insight EXP for that genus category.

Each genus has its own Genus Insight progression with up to 9 unlockable slots. Leveling up Genus Insight opens new slots and lets you analyze effects using colored Soul Crystals. Each genus uses its own crystal type:

Cogni — blue Soul Crystals
Fera — red Soul Crystals
Natura — green Soul Crystals
Varian — their own crystal type

The Genus Insight stats vary by type too. Fera pets contribute to ground mount speed bonuses. Cogni pets improve HP, Critical Hit, and Might. Natura pets add Stamina (which affects sprinting). Varian pets contribute to Evasion and sprint-cost stats. For travel speed improvement specifically, Fera pets are the genus to focus on, since they directly add Mount Ground Move Speed at Pet Insight levels 1, 2, and 3.

Genus Insight progress is also shared across all your characters on the same server. The highest value any of your characters reaches is used for all of them, and pet levels stack together. Work done on your main character benefits your alts automatically.

For a new player making their first pet selection, none of this requires deep optimization. Just know that the genus of the pet you pick gives a small push toward that genus’s overall progression track — and you can build the rest over time.

Should You Pick a Specific Genus Pet?

Only if you already have a plan. Here is a simple breakdown:

Want better mount ground speed? Pick Papis (Fera). Fera pets directly contribute to ground move speed Owned Effects, and you will also get a Fossa (also Fera) from the Episode 1 quest. Doubling up on Fera pushes that genus’s progress faster.
Want a pet that is harder to farm later? Pick Black Smoke Murute (Natura). It cannot be directly farmed from open-world monsters, so getting it from the selection chest saves you sourcing it from chests and events later.
No preference? Pick the one that looks best to you. All four are valid, and the others can be collected later.

Can You Get the Other Pets Later?

Yes, for most of them. Three of the four pets in the selection chest can also be obtained through normal gameplay:

Papis (Fera) — can be farmed by defeating specific monsters. Check the Source tab in your Pets menu to see spawn locations.
Silver Blade Rotan (Varian) — can also be farmed from monsters.
Konutin Worker (Cogni) — available through chests and other sources.
Black Smoke Murute (Natura) — cannot be directly farmed from monsters. Obtained through chests and limited sources. This makes it slightly harder to get later.

If you are planning your collection long-term and already have easy access to Papis Souls through your leveling route, picking Black Smoke Murute from the chest is the most efficient use of a selection chest. But again — this only matters if collection optimization is something you care about right now. Appearance-first is perfectly fine.

Pet Collection Milestones and Why Collection Depth Matters

Your pet collection pays out rewards at milestone numbers. You get rewards at 5 pets owned, then at every 10 pets up to 500. These rewards give your character permanent stat boosts and unlocks, which means collecting more pets — even ones you never actively ride — is quietly making your character stronger all the time.

This is why the advice to “just pick your favourite” is genuinely good advice. Whether you pick by appearance or by Genus, you are adding one pet to your collection and working toward the next milestone. The selection chest is a starting point, not a defining decision.

For a deeper look at building your pet collection efficiently, see our AION 2 How to Get Pets Fast guide and our full list of all pets in AION 2.

Quick Summary — What to Do With Your Pet Selection Chest

Claim the Advance: Pet Chest from your System mail first.
Use it in your inventory — you get Pagati automatically, plus the selection chest.
Open the selection chest and choose from Papis, Silver Blade Rotan, Konutin Worker, or Black Smoke Murute.
If you have no preference, go with appearance. No stat is locked behind any one choice.
If you want mount speed, pick Papis (Fera).
If you want the rarest option, pick Black Smoke Murute (Natura) since it cannot be farmed from monsters.
Equip your pet through the Pets section in the menu or via the Closet.
Start farming Souls to push your new pet to Pet Insight level 2 and 3 as you level up.

Where to Play AION 2

AION 2 is free to play. Get started here:

AION 2 Pet Selection Chest Guide — Which Pet Should You Choose?

What Is the AION 2 Pet Selection Chest?

How to Claim and Open the Pet Selection Chest

What Pets Are Inside the Advance: Pet Selection Chest?